942449

research-article2020
SRDXXX10.1177/2378023120942449SociusNoonan et al.

Original Article Socius: Sociological Research for

a Dynamic World
Volume 6: 1­–20
Boxed In: Beliefs about the Compatibility © The Author(s) 2020
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DOI: 10.1177/2378023120942449
https://doi.org/10.1177/2378023120942449

Father-Occupation Role Combinations

srd.sagepub.com

Mary C. Noonan1 , Freda B. Lynn1, and Mark H. Walker2

Abstract
Researchers have long noted that role expectations of a “good” mother conflict with those of a “good” worker,
described as the “cultural contradiction” of motherhood. But given that work roles vary tremendously in terms of the
cultural meanings the public assigns them, the authors examine variability in the perceived compatibility of mother-
occupation and father-occupation combinations. Building on previous research, the authors hypothesize that (1) some
parent-occupation pairings will be viewed as significantly less compatible because of incongruent expectations and
meanings, and (2) incumbents of supposedly compatible parent-occupation pairings will be evaluated more favorably
than incumbents of incompatible pairings. Both hypotheses are tested using original survey data on perceptions of
mothers and fathers in 28 occupations merged with occupational characteristics from secondary data sources. The
results strongly suggest that even though there are well-known prescriptive norms for both mothers and fathers,
mothers’ occupational choices are more actively policed compared with fathers’.

Keywords
role compatibility, motherhood, fatherhood, occupational roles, cultural beliefs, social valuation

Cultural scripts guide individuals on how to act in social
roles (e.g., mother, friend, worker) (Burke and Stets 2009;
Heise 2007; Stryker 1980). These cultural scripts are simul-
taneously used by observers to evaluate role performances,
such as whether an individual is a “good” or “bad” mother,
friend, or worker. Observers may shame or punish those who
deviate from role expectations with acts of discrimination or
social exclusion (Eagly and Karau 2002; see also Mize and
Manago 2018). The prospect of punishment can in fact con-
strain which roles individuals strive to inhabit (Lee 1998)
and influence role incumbents’ choices, effectively forcing
them “to compromise themselves” in order to feel socially
accepted in their roles (Settles 2004:489). Moreover, the
shame and punishment that stem from the policing of roles
may ultimately undermine role incumbents’ mental health
(Simon 1995; Thoits 2013).
The broad objective of this study is to investigate the polic-
ing process around individuals combining two roles. We
address two questions: Does the public perceive some role
combinations to be more compatible than others? In turn, are
those who inhabit incompatible roles socially devalued? Our
study focuses specifically on parent-occupation role combina-
tions. We begin by examining public perceptions about which
occupations mothers and fathers “should” and “should not”
hold, while highlighting differences between the two groups.
Next, we compare how harshly mothers and fathers are judged
if they work in so-called incompatible occupations.
Scholars have theorized that incumbents who inhabit two
roles with a high level of perceived incongruity will face sig-
nificant prejudice (e.g., Eagly and Karau 2002; Okimoto and
Heilman 2012; Settles 2004). But empirical tests of the role
congruity theory of prejudice have been relatively limited in
that they typically focus on women in only one occupation or
work role (e.g., female leaders, mothers in female- vs. male-
typed jobs, or female scientists). We examine pairings of
mothers and fathers across different occupations, thus provid-
ing the first systematic empirical test of the correlation between
perceptions of role compatibility and perceptions of incum-
bent’s social value, such as their likability. More specifically,
1
University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA
2
Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA, USA
Corresponding Author:
Mary C. Noonan, University of Iowa, Department of Sociology and
Criminology, 401 North Hall, Iowa City, Iowa 52242, USA
Email: mary-noonan-1@uiowa.edu

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2 Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World 
we test whether mothers and fathers suffer different penalties
for making “incompatible” occupational choices. In summary,
although the extant literature tells us that prescriptive norms
for both mothers and fathers exist, our analysis provides
empirical evidence on the extent to which the public enforces
these norms with respect to parents’ occupational choice. We
also offer insight into whether the roles of mothers and fathers
are differentially policed.
To carry out these objectives, we gather original survey
data on perceptions of compatibility and likability of moth-
ers and fathers in 28 occupations in the United States.
Drawing on research about what it means to be a “good”
mother and “good” father in modern America (Hays 1996;
Kimmel and Messner 1992; Ridgeway and Correll 2004),
and research on occupation-specific meanings and stereo-
types (e.g., White and White 2006), we hypothesize that the
public will construe certain role combinations, such as
mother-teacher or mother-pediatrician, to be more compati-
ble than others, such as mother-scientist or mother-lawyer.
More generally, we expect that occupations that seemingly
align with the prescribed norms around motherhood and
fatherhood will be perceived as the most compatible. That
said, because mothers and fathers are expected to be and do
different things, the correlates of compatibility are expected
to be different for mothers and fathers. Finally, on the basis
of the role congruity theory of prejudice, we hypothesize that
the public will find role combinations that are less compati-
ble to be less appealing and likable.
An empirical study of how these parent-worker roles are
policed is long overdue given that the vast majority of par-
ents today work outside of the home. Approximately 70 per-
cent of mothers and 93 percent of fathers with children under
the age of 18 work for pay at least part-time (Bureau of Labor
Statistics 2015). This does not represent a significant increase
over time for fathers, but it does for mothers, especially
among those with young children (Patten 2015). In the wake
of this increase, scholars have closely examined, as detailed
below, how perceptions of incompatibility and social
approval vary for mothers with different work statuses (i.e.,
full-time, part-time, or not at all) (e.g., Bridges and Etaugh
1995; Jacobs and Gerson 2016). But now that such a large
proportion of mothers are working, we argue that it is impor-
tant to expand the investigation to specific occupational roles
in combination with motherhood.
By quantifying the extent to which the public perceives it
as compatible to combine the role of parent with various
occupational identities, our study also helps unpack cultural
assumptions about the roles of mother and father themselves.
Our findings suggest that there are relatively strict “rules”
dictating which occupational roles are right for mothers.
Moreover, these rules align almost perfectly with the vast
literature on cultural definitions of good mothering (i.e.,
occupations that are safe and provide part-time work oppor-
tunities) and feminine identity (i.e., occupations that are
female dominated and involve ethically oriented work).
Furthermore, the results show that the public values mothers
more when they work in occupations compatible with moth-
ering and the feminine identity.
In contrast, our results suggest that the prescriptive ste-
reotypes around working fathers are much weaker.
Stereotypes dictate that fathers should be in authoritative,
masculine work roles associated with high earning potential,
but our results show that the only correlate of father-occupa-
tion compatibility is the level of authority in the occupational
role. Furthermore, the relationship between incompatibility
and unlikability is far weaker for fathers. We address the
implications of these findings in the discussion.
Perceived Role Compatibility: Parent
and Worker Combinations
Broadly, theory suggests that any two social roles will be
perceived as (in)compatible if the expectations and meanings
associated with one are construed as (mis)aligned with those
of the other (Eagly and Karau 2002; Hays 1996). For exam-
ple, well-known work on the cultural contradictions of moth-
erhood (e.g., Blair-Loy 2001; Hays 1996) highlights how the
dominant ideology around being a “good” mother (i.e.,
warm, nurturing, and always available for family) funda-
mentally conflicts with modern ideals associated with “good”
workers (i.e., cool-headed, competitive, and always “on call”
to the employer). That is, regardless of the degree to which a
working mother feels that her work and motherhood demands
are incompatible, the public legitimizes and polices the
boundaries of the motherhood role (as well as the worker
role) by claiming that the pairing of mother and worker roles
is culturally incompatible because of their contradictory role
expectations.
But given that work roles vary tremendously in terms of
both objective features (e.g., percentage who work part-time
in an occupation) and the meanings (e.g., helpful, powerful)
the public associates with them (Gottfredson 1981; White
and White 2006; see also Freeland and Hoey 2018; Valentino
forthcoming), it seems likely that some occupations might be
perceived as more compatible with motherhood or father-
hood, which is precisely why other occupations stand out as
incompatible. Our first objective, then, is to test the extent to
which our theoretical knowledge regarding the cultural defi-
nitions of “good” and “bad” mothers and fathers predict per-
ceptions of incompatibility: among mothers (and fathers)
who are employed, to what extent do extant cultural stereo-
types explain why certain kinds of work roles (i.e., occupa-
tions) are widely construed to be less compatible with
motherhood (and fatherhood) compared to others?1
1
Research on gender, family, and work has explored how and why
women’s and men’s experiences of work-family conflict vary across
occupations (e.g., Dierdorff and Ellington 2008; Yu and Kuo 2018).
In the present study, we are concerned instead with whether percep-
tions of parent-occupation compatibility vary across occupations.
Noonan et al. 3
Despite decades of research on the incompatibility of gen-
der roles and work roles, systematic knowledge as to which
occupations are culturally defined as more or less incompat-
ible with motherhood (and fatherhood) remains lacking.
Most studies of incompatibility are designed around just one
or a few types of role combinations selected intentionally
because they are already widely believed to be incongruous
(e.g., Blair-Loy 2001; Eagly and Karau 2002; Okimoto and
Heilman 2012; Steinke 2017). For example, research finds
that the cultural expectations associated with being a woman
and being a leader are inconsistent because the woman role is
culturally associated with communal qualities whereas the
leadership role is associated with agentic qualities (e.g.,
Eagly and Karau 2002; Tinkler et al. 2019).2 Similarly, the
role of scientist is perceived to be more compatible if filled
by a man rather than a woman: societal stereotypes consis-
tently communicate that scientists are “supposed” to be
objective and rational men (Barbercheck 2001), specifically
men who are “white, middle-aged or elderly, unattractive,
dressed in a lab coat and glasses, geeky or nerdy, socially
awkward, and . . . who work alone” (Steinke 2017:2; see also
Thébaud and Charles 2018). Unlike these studies, our study
is designed explicitly to examine perceived compatibility
across a variety of parent-occupation role combinations,
such as mother-scientist, mother-politician, and mother-
teacher. Our core hypothesis is that the degree of compatibil-
ity for a given parent-occupation pairing depends on how
well the expectations and meanings of the occupational role
fit with the expectations and meanings of the parenting role.
Below, we outline the dominant cultural beliefs of what it
means to be a good mother and good father in contemporary
U.S. society. Note that our interest lies specifically in the cul-
tural expectations of what good mothers and fathers should
do for their children and families, not what they actually do.
These injunctive or prescriptive norms are “consensual
expectations about what a group of people ought to do or ide-
ally would do” (Eagly and Karau 2002:574; Prentice and
Carranza 2002). We pay specific attention to the place of
paid work within the roles of mother and father and review
empirical studies that explore perceptions of incompatibility
between motherhood, fatherhood, and paid work more
generally.
Two important points about the scope of our study need to
be highlighted before moving forward. First, the literature on
ideologies surrounding motherhood and fatherhood is based
largely on white, middle-class men and women, which means
2 3
Tinkler et al. (2019) further argued that race and gender intersect
to create unique cultural expectations for various racial subgroups
of women and men in the workplace. Compared with white women,
white men, and Asian American men, they found that Asian
American women are deemed the least suitable for leadership roles
because the prescriptive stereotypes about Asian American women
(i.e., highly deferential, feminine, nonaggressive) most contradict
the stereotypes of leaders (e.g., agentic, dominant, authoritative).
that the prescriptive norms discussed below are best inter-
preted as pertaining to this particular segment of the popula-
tion. Given that this is a first step toward measuring how
mother-occupation and father-occupation roles are policed,
we do not unpack the multitude of stereotypes about parent-
hood and occupational roles, and we recognize the limita-
tions of not doing so. Scholars have long noted, for example,
that cultural understandings of what it means to be a good
mother or father (as well as definitions of femininity and
masculinity) vary across races and ethnicities (e.g., Cazenave
1979; Collins 1987; Glenn 1992; Kimmel and Messner
1992). Similarly, research suggests that there may be specific
stereotypes associated with specific kinds of mothers and
fathers (e.g., single moms, deadbeat dads, tiger moms, snow-
plow parents) (see Mandell 2002; Valiquette-Tessier,
Vandette, and Gosselin 2015). We strongly suspect that per-
ceptions of (in)compatibility of various parent-worker role
combinations will likely vary with respect to these character-
istics (see, e.g., Cuddy and Wolf 2013), but we leave for
future research the detailed study of the contingencies of
types and their intersections.
Second, our sample is disproportionately composed of
white and relatively well-educated respondents, which means
that our empirical study is best characterized as measuring the
cultural perceptions of specifically this segment of the popula-
tion. These limitations are addressed in the discussion section.
On a related note, in part because of the limitations of our sam-
ple, our empirical analysis does not unpack whether certain
members of the public police parent-occupation roles more or
less aggressively or if they apply different “rules” when polic-
ing. Although research clearly shows that the symbolic mean-
ings assigned to cultural objects can vary by social location
(e.g., Gauchat and Andrews 2018, Lynn and Ellerbach 2017),
we also consider this outside the scope of the present study.
With that in mind, we briefly summarize below previous
research on “good” mothers and fathers (broadly defined).
Overall, mothers’ and fathers’ primary activities within the
family (i.e., caretaking and/or breadwinning) have changed
somewhat since the 1970s, albeit more for mothers than for
fathers (Sayer 2005). Since that time, mothers have increased
their labor force participation and contributions to the family
income, and men have taken on more caregiving responsibil-
ity (i.e., childcare and housework). Despite these changes,
within married families mothers remain primarily responsi-
ble for caretaking and fathers remain primarily responsible
for breadwinning (Haines, Deaux, and Lofaro 2016).3
Although this general statement is accurate regardless of racial
and ethnic background, the likelihood of a wife’s being the pri-
mary breadwinner in her family is highest among African American
women and lowest among Latino women (with white women and
Asian women falling in between these two groups) (Wang 2019).
With respect to housework, husbands’ contribution is smallest
among Latinos and Asians and largest among whites and blacks
(Wight, Bianchi, and Hunt 2013)
4 Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World 
The Good Mother
According to the dominant ideology of “intensive mother-
ing” (Hays 1996), a “good” mother is expected to be “always
there” for her children (Kobrynowicz and Biernat 1997;
Russo 1979) and will “direct her time and emotional energy
toward her children without limit” (Ridgeway and Correll
2004:690). In addition, a good mother is an unselfish nur-
turer (Hays 1996), and as such, the cultural stereotypes
around motherhood are closely linked to those of women’s
being community-oriented (Eagly and Steffen 1984;
Ridgeway and Correll 2004:687) and generally more moral
than men (see Epstein 1992:244). Given the importance of
bonding and early life attachment between infant and care-
giver (Bowlby 1982), mothers are generally seen as less
replaceable—or less “insurable”—than fathers, especially
when children are young (DeLeire and Levy 2004).
Paid work does not generally mesh with our societal per-
ceptions of the good mother. Perhaps most obviously, paid
work and caregiving both demand significant time and energy.
Thus, working mothers are assumed to have less family com-
mitment compared with nonworking mothers and less work
commitment compared with men and childless women
(Mincer and Polachek 1974). In addition to time-based con-
flict, work and motherhood also conflict in terms of cultural
expectations around behavior (e.g., Blair-Loy 2001; Hays
1996; Williams 1999). That is, there are conflicting ideas
about how working mothers should behave at work and at
home: they must be “cool-headed and competitive at work
but warm-hearted and nurturing at home” (Hays 1996:10).
Not surprisingly, empirical research finds that compared
with nonemployed mothers, employed mothers are perceived
to be less communal (Bridges 1987; Riggs 1997), especially
if they remain employed when their children are infants
(Bridges and Orza 1993) or if they work for personal fulfill-
ment rather than financial necessity (Bridges and Etaugh
1995; Okimoto and Heilman 2012). The number of hours a
mother works and her marital status also affect attitudes
about employed mothers; approval of a working mother
increases if she is portrayed as working part-time (vs. full-
time) or if she is single (vs. married) (Jacobs and Gerson
2016).
The Good Father
The dominant perspective of the “good” father is that of pro-
vider. Contemporary research on fathers suggests that a good
father no longer only provides income for his family but is
also active in taking care of his children (Dermott and Miller
2015; Kaufman and Uhlenberg 2000). Despite this new
“involved father” model, the pervasive norm in contempo-
rary U.S. society still equates successful fatherhood with
breadwinning (Coltrane 2004; Deutsch and Saxon 1998; see
also Randles 2018). That is, fathers are “culturally expected
to provide and protect” primarily through breadwinning and
not via direct care for their children (Ridgeway and Correll
2004:695).
The notion that fathers are essential breadwinners for the
family is also intertwined with the still common perception
that fathers provide their families with an authoritative, dis-
ciplinary figure who—more so now through breadwinning
than physical force—protects the family from “bad guys”
and bad circumstances (Summers et al. 1999). The fatherly
hero-protector is generally portrayed as someone who stably
leverages authority and physical superiority, both traits
linked to stereotypes of manliness (e.g., Young 2003). Note
that fathers are also expected to be caring but—in terms of
dominant cultural norms—are “allowed” to show that caring
through authoritativeness, discipline, and breadwinning. In
stark contrast to the role of mother, employment is seen as an
integral part of fathers’ identity (Ranson 2011). In fact, a
large body of work explores the cultural centrality of being a
good worker—and thus a good provider—for fathers
(Coltrane 2004; Pleck 1987).
Not surprisingly, empirical research supports the mandate
that fathers work in order to provide financially for their
families. For example, in an experimental study, Riggs
(1997) found that approval ratings of fathers decrease sig-
nificantly if they give up a job that provides financially secu-
rity in order to take care of their children. In other work,
Brescoll and Uhlmann (2005) found that employed fathers
are evaluated more positively than stay-at-home fathers, and
Rochlen et al.’s (2010) qualitative research study on approxi-
mately 200 stay-at-home fathers showed that about half
experienced “stigma-based” incidents because of this role.
Likewise, Pedulla (2016) found that prospective employers
are far less likely to hire applicants who are men compared
with women with part-time work histories, and Jacobs and
Gerson (2016) found that if a hypothetical family (with a
pre-school-aged child) depends on the father’s income, the
public generally believes that he should stay at his full-time
job even if he is not satisfied with the job or with the family’s
childcare arrangements. Interestingly, the majority of respon-
dents in Jacobs and Gerson’s (2016) study approved of the
father’s switching to part-time or to becoming a stay-at-home
dad, but only if the family does not depend on his income.
All in all, prior research strongly suggests that the social
mandate for fathers to provide for their families has not
dwindled despite mothers’ increased financial contributions
to the family income (Riggs 1997).
Hypotheses: Parent-Occupation Compatibility
To sum up, (1) the “good” mother is a nurturing and warm
figure who puts her caretaking duties above all others, (2) the
“good” father is an authoritative figure who protects and pro-
vides for his family mainly through breadwinning, and (3)
prior research shows that paid employment is perceived to be
generally incompatible for mothers and compatible for fathers.
The key point and focus of the present study, however, is that
Noonan et al. 5
there is tremendous variation in work roles in terms of the
objective features of occupations as well as stereotypes associ-
ated with occupational identities.
In terms of objective features, occupations vary across a
number of dimensions (U.S. Department of Labor 2016),
such as sex composition,4 earnings, educational require-
ments, work hours (part-time positions), working conditions
(e.g., exposure to hazards), level of authority (e.g., manager
or supervisor), and skill demands (e.g., manual vs. nonman-
ual) (see, e.g., Charles and Grusky 2004; Freeland and Hoey
2018; Reskin 1993). Moreover, research suggests that adults
are relatively accurate in judging occupations on a variety of
dimensions, including earnings and physical requirements
(Walls 2000) and sex composition (Cejka and Eagly 1999).
In addition, sociologists have long noted that the public
assigns symbolic meaning to occupations (e.g., Duncan
1961; Lynn and Ellerbach 2017; Martin 2000). Freeland and
Hoey’s (2018) research on occupational identities suggests
two major axes along which occupations are symbolically
evaluated in the United States: goodness or honor (e.g., we
commonly throw parades for firefighters but not business
executives) and power5 (e.g., we think of business executives
as wielding power over others given their financial clout,
educational training, and social capital).6 For example, cer-
tain occupations, such as doctor, are associated with high
levels of goodness and power, whereas other honorable
occupations, such as nursing assistant or social worker, are
associated with considerably less power (e.g., see Freeland
and Hoey 2018:259). Some occupational identities, such as
lawyer or police officer, are assigned far more power than
goodness, while others, such as salesperson, rank low on
both dimensions (see Appendix B).
Given this variability, we suspect that certain mother- and
father-occupation pairings will be construed as more or less
compatible depending on how they complement the domi-
nant prescriptive norms as to what mothers and fathers
should and should not do. For mothers, we hypothesize that
four specific aspects of occupations will be related to percep-
tions of mother-occupation compatibility. First, given the
dominant prescriptive norm that mothers should be there “all
the time” for their kids (Hays 1996; Ridgeway and Correll
2004), we hypothesize that mother-occupation compatibility
4
When discussing the proportion of women and men in a given
occupation, we use the term sex instead of gender to follow the
government’s measurement approach to occupational characteris-
tics (i.e., numbers of women and men employed in the occupation).
5
In this context, power refers to social authority, not physical power.
6
Freeland and Hoey showed that the traditional occupational
prestige scores derived from the General Social Survey’s “social
standing” question are highly correlated with the power dimen-
sion, whereas the Weberian concept of status (the likelihood that
a worker from one occupation defers to another from a different
occupation) is highly correlated with the goodness or honor dimen-
sion of occupational meanings.
will be positively correlated with the percentage of part-time
workers in the occupation (hypothesis 1a) and negatively
correlated with the level of danger associated with the occu-
pation (hypothesis 1b).
Many believe, as expressed by former U.S. senator Rick
Santorum (2005), that something “bad” must have happened
in America such that mothers are now willing to “leave their
children in the care of someone else.” According to the 2012
General Social Survey, 42 percent of a nationally representa-
tive sample of Americans (n = 977) say that it is “best” if a
mother works part-time (and a father works full-time) in
families with pre-school-aged children. In contrast, fewer
than .5 percent of respondents say that it would be “best” if
the mother works full-time (and the father works part-time).
Hence, we expect that occupations that have stronger tradi-
tions of offering part-time work opportunities will be viewed
as more compatible with motherhood.
For similar reasons, we expect that occupations that rou-
tinely put workers in physical danger will be perceived as
contradictory to motherhood. As noted earlier, mothers are
“supposed” to be children’s primary caretakers and thus are,
in a sense, priceless (i.e., not insurable). A job that threatens
a mother’s life clearly jeopardizes the chance that she will
“be there” for her child and is therefore likely to be seen as a
poor fit.
Entwined with the primary caretaking role is the notion of
mothers as nurturing forces and comforters (Hays 1996). We
therefore suspect that the mother role will be viewed as more
compatible with occupations associated with warmth and high
ethical standards; conversely, occupations that are culturally
stereotyped as slimy, aggressive, or ruthless in nature will be
viewed as less compatible with motherhood. Finally, because
motherhood is often viewed as an extreme of the more general
expectations associated with “woman” (Ridgeway and Correll
2004:687), we expect that occupations construed as “right” for
women will be perceived as more compatible with the mother
role. Thus, we also hypothesize that mother-occupation com-
patibility will be positively correlated with the warmth and
goodness associated with the occupation (hypothesis 1c) and
positively correlated with the percentage of female workers in
the occupation (hypothesis 1d).
For fathers, we hypothesize that four aspects of occupa-
tions will be associated with father-occupation compatibility.
First, given the primacy of breadwinning in the cultural nar-
rative of the good father (Pleck 1987), we suspect that fathers
“should” be, above all, in occupations that allow them to
earn a “good living” (i.e., occupations that offer well-paid,
full-time employment opportunities will be perceived as
more compatible for fathers). To this point, we hypothesize
that father-occupation compatibility will be positively cor-
related with the wage-earning potential in the occupation
(hypothesis 2a) and negatively correlated with the percent-
age of part-time workers in the occupation (hypothesis 2b).
Entwined with breadwinning is the notion of fathers as
authoritative figures in the family (Ridgeway and Correll
6 Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World 
2004). Whereas mothers are supposed to protect and care for
children, fathers are culturally scripted to be the leaders of
their families. Thus, an occupation that complements the
father role would be one that is associated with power and
authority. For this reason, we hypothesize that father-occupa-
tion compatibility will be positively correlated with the
power and authority associated with the occupation (hypoth-
esis 2c). Similarly, female-dominated jobs offer lower pay
(Levanon, England, and Allison 2009), and female role iden-
tities are typically associated with less power (Kroska 2014).7
For both of these reasons, plus the fact that the public is
likely to perceive a father working in a “woman’s job” as
wrong or incompatible because it violates gender norms, we
expect that father-occupation compatibility will be nega-
tively correlated with the percentage of female workers in
the occupation (hypothesis 2d).
Valuation of Individuals Occupying
Compatible versus Incompatible Roles
Next, we review prior work that examined the extent to
which individuals who combine two supposedly incongru-
ous roles are culturally sanctioned. Eagly and Karau’s (2002)
“role congruity theory of prejudice” argues that a group
member (e.g., woman) attempting to fulfill a given role (e.g.,
leader) will be devalued if the presumed characteristics of
the group member are misaligned with the socially ascribed
demands of the role. In short, if two roles are believed to be
incompatible, the incumbent will be punished.
Prior empirical research strongly suggests that women are
indeed sanctioned for attempting to combine motherhood
with a supposedly incompatible work role. Okimoto and
Heilman (2012), for example, examined evaluations of three
groups of mothers—those employed in male sex–typed jobs,
those employed in female sex–typed jobs, and those who are
nonemployed—and found that it is only mothers in male
sex–typed jobs that are perceived more negatively (i.e., less
communal, worse parents, less interpersonally appealing)
than nonemployed mothers. They concluded that it is not
“working per se that decreased working mothers’ social
acceptance but working in a gender-inconsistent job” (p.
715). In a related study, Heilman et al. (2004) similarly found
that “successful” women who work in male-dominated occu-
pational roles are rated as less likable and perceived with
more hostility (e.g., less trustworthy, more manipulative)
than women or men who work in female-dominated or neu-
tral occupational roles.
On the basis of this past research, we hypothesize that
mothers working in occupations that are viewed as good fits
7
To be clear, not all male-dominated occupations are associated
with high levels of power, nor are all male-dominated jobs associ-
ated with high pay. A laborer, for example, is associated with low
authority (i.e., power) and relatively low pay (Appendix B), even
though the occupation is heavily male dominated.
with motherhood will be viewed as more likable individuals
and better mothers compared with those working in occupa-
tions that are viewed as more contradictory to the ideal
mother role (hypothesis 3). In other words, the social valua-
tion (Lamont 2012) of working mothers will be shaped by
the perceived compatibility of their occupations with their
roles as mothers. The likability penalty constitutes a more
active form of policing relative to merely perceiving the two
roles as incompatible.
It is less clear, however, if fathers will be subject to the
same social sanctions for working in occupations that are
deemed incompatible with fatherhood. In general, as noted
by Rudman and Phelan (2008), there is far more research on
the topic of negative sanctions for counter-stereotypical
behavior for women and mothers relative to men (and fathers
in particular). Findings from studies that have explored this
issue for men are mixed. On the one hand, Heilman et al.’s
(2004) results suggest that men working in female-typed
jobs are not seen as less likable compared with those in neu-
tral- or male-typed jobs.8 This same form of gender asym-
metry in sanctioning was noted by Rudman and Glick (1999),
who argued that prescriptive stereotypes for women may be
stronger than those for men, and thus violations will be more
costly for women than men. After all, if the dominant pre-
scriptive stereotype is that men should be breadwinners, the
public may pass judgement on whether a father’s occupation
is compatible but then reserve more active forms of social
sanctioning only for those who do not work.
On the other hand, some studies suggest that the penalty
to men who transgress prescriptive gender role norms is even
greater than that to women (e.g., Cahill and Adams 1997;
Cherry and Deaux 1978; Sandnabba and Ahlberg 1999).
Also, as noted earlier, Pedulla (2016) showed that fathers are
indeed punished for having the “wrong” type of employment
situation (i.e., a history of part-time work). Given these
mixed findings, we leave as an open question the extent to
which fathers are socially penalized for working in occupa-
tions that are viewed as poor complements to fatherhood.
Data
We test our hypotheses by analyzing original survey data on
perceptions of 28 parent-occupation pairings. We chose these
28 occupational identities because goodness and power ratings,
key variables in our analysis, were publicly available for them
at the time we collected our data. Importantly, these 28 occupa-
tions also exhibit substantial variability on the other key occu-
pational characteristics we incorporate into our analyses.
Our sample includes 188 participants who were recruited
via Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) in March 2014 and
8
The authors did note that the specific types of penalties men
receive for engaging in norm-violating behavior may not be the
same as those for women (e.g., disrespect vs. dislike) and, if so, that
this may explain the lack of findings for men in their study.
Noonan et al. 7
were paid $1 for their participation in the study. The sample
is 84 percent white, 53 percent self-identified female, and 50
percent married or cohabiting; 38 percent are parents, and 47
percent have bachelor’s degrees or higher. The average age
in the sample is 35 years, and the median income is $45,000.
Participants were randomly assigned to rate either mother-
occupation role pairings (n = 96) or father-occupation role
pairings (n = 92). To ease rater fatigue, participants were
assigned to rate only 16 of the 28 potential pairings. In sum,
approximately 50 respondents rated each parent-occupation
pairing on several dimensions.
There are clear limitations to the generalizability of our
results given this relatively small MTurk sample. Like other
MTurk samples, ours is disproportionately white, young, and
highly educated compared with the U.S. population as a
whole (see Levay, Freese, and Druckman 2016). Levay et al.
(2016) suggested that credible inferences to the population
can be made with MTurk results if, at the least, the following
nine variables are accounted for: age, gender, race and eth-
nicity, income, education, marital status, religion, ideology,
and partisanship. We did not collect data on all nine, nor
would we likely have enough variation on these nine to ben-
efit from weighting the data given our sample size. As a
result, we caution against generalizing our results beyond the
segment of the population for which we have data. On the
positive side, however, studies have found that the quality of
the data collected from MTurk respondents is actually high
compared with other online research panels (Chandler et al.
2019), which gives us confidence that the results are at least
meaningful, if only generalizable to this segment of the
population.
Analytic Plan
The empirical analysis is presented in two parts. First, we
determine the extent to which mean perceptions of parent-
occupation compatibility correlate with a core set of occupa-
tion-level characteristics. We calculate correlation statistics
between each of the occupation-level characteristics and
parent-occupation compatibility separately for fathers and
mothers. Next, we estimate a regression model predicting
parent-occupation compatibility as a function of the occupa-
tion-level measures, again separately for fathers and moth-
ers. In the regression, our focus is on the R2 measure in the
full model; this tells us the percentage of variability in par-
ent-occupation compatibility we are able to explain with all
four of the occupation-level measures.
Second, we examine the association between parent-
occupation compatibility and potential “consequences” for
the pairing, including perceptions of likability, sincerity,
trustworthiness, and attentiveness to children. More specifi-
cally, we estimate a regression model predicting each of the
four parent-occupation valuation measures as a function of
the parent-occupation compatibility measure, again sepa-
rately for fathers and mothers. Our focus in the regressions is
on the extent to which perceived compatibility can explain
how incumbents are valued.
Measures
Beliefs about the Compatibility of Parent-
Occupation Role Combinations
Beliefs about the compatibility of parent-occupation role
combinations are operationalized with the following survey
item: “How natural do you think it is to combine the roles of
[mother/father] and [occupational role]?” (1 = “very unnatu-
ral,” 6 = “very natural”).9 See Table 1A for a descriptive
summary of each measure. Overall, the mean compatibility
score for mothers is 4.10 (SD = .67), and for fathers it is 4.15
(SD = .49). To capture both within- and between-occupation
variability, Figure A1 in Appendix A shows the distribution
of compatibility scores (95 percent confidence intervals
[CIs]) for each of the 28 mother- and father-occupation pair-
ings, ordered from most to least compatible. For example,
the estimated 95 percent CI for a mother-pediatrician (5.03–
5.52) is statistically higher than that of a mother-attorney
(3.11–3.72). Similarly, the 95 percent CI for father-professor
(4.39–4.93) does not overlap with that of father-surgeon
(3.53–4.14).
Occupational Characteristics
As described in Appendix B, data from the 2016 American
Community Survey are used to measure percentage part-
time, which is the percentage of workers within an occupa-
tion who work fewer than 35 hours per week. High exposure
to death (1 = yes, 0 = no) is derived from 2017 Census of
Fatal Occupational Injuries data on fatal injury rates by occu-
pation. Median annual wage (in 2017 dollars) for each occu-
pation comes from version 20.1 of O*NET. Finally,
percentage female for 19 occupations comes from the 2018
Current Population Survey. The remainder of the data come
from professional associations and other published sources.
To measure the extent to which the public perceives occu-
pations to be associated with goodness and power, we use,
respectively, the “evaluation” and “potency” scores linked to
the occupational identity from the 2003 INTERACT senti-
ment dictionary.10 Building from the semantic differential
9
We use the word natural in a colloquial sense, as in whether the
given parent-occupation pairing seems to be in “agreement” or a
“good match” with cultural norms. It is possible that respondents
interpret the word to mean compatibility in an inherent or biologi-
cal sense. Regardless, these compatibility perceptions are simply
respondents’ opinions about what objects or ideas “go together”
(see Hunzaker and Valentino 2019). We subscribe to the view that
“culture is, by definition, anything but natural” (Goldberg and Stein
2018:925).
10
At the time we ran our survey experiment (March 2014), the 2003
version of the INTERACT dictionary was the most recent version
8 Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World 

Table 1.  Descriptive Statistics.

Mean SD Minimum Maximum n

A. Beliefs about role combinations  
  Mean compatibility  
  Mother-occupation 4.10 .67 2.92 5.43 28
  Father-occupation 4.15 .49 3.34 5.19 28
  Mean likability  
  Mother-occupation 6.62 .70 4.98 7.66 28
  Father-occupation 6.55 .59 5.15 7.47 28
  Mean sincerity  
  Mother-occupation 6.77 .63 5.07 7.87 28
  Father-occupation 6.71 .72 4.88 7.68 28
  Mean trustworthiness  
  Mother-occupation 6.73 .65 4.99 7.82 28
  Father-occupation 6.65 .61 5.08 7.61 28
  Mean attentiveness to children  
  Mother-occupation 6.58 .70 5.33 8.05 28
  Father-occupation 6.46 .75 5.16 7.96 28
B. Occupational characteristics  
  Percentage part-timea 16.80 14.42 1.10 60.30 27
  High exposure to death (1 = yes, 0 = no)b 14.29% 0 1 28
  Median annual wage (in 2017 dollars)c 93,475.25 85,63.39 20,28.00 352,00.00 28
  Percentage femaled 44.26 28.28 3.50 94.00 28
  Evaluation (goodness)e 1.26 .82 –.38 2.77 28
  Potency (power)e 1.36 .81 –.49 2.82 28

Note: See Figure A1 in Appendix A for details on measures and occupation crosswalks.
a
Source: American Community Survey (U.S. Census Bureau, U.S. Department of Commerce, https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/acs). Part-time
status is not available for military occupations.
b
Source: Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries (Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, https://www.bls.gov/iif/oshcfoi1.htm).
c
Source: O*NET (Employment and Training Administration, U.S. Department of Labor, https://www.doleta.gov/programs/onet/eta_default.cfm).
d
Source: Current Population Survey (Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, https://www.bls.gov/cps/cpsaat11.htm) and others.
e
Source: INTERACT (Francis and Heise 2006).

scale developed by Osgood et al. (1975), the INTERACT
sentiment dictionary measures three affective responses to
social concepts—evaluation (good vs. bad), potency (power-
ful vs. weak), and activity (active vs. quiet) (Francis and
Heise 2006). In their study of occupational identities,
Freeland and Hoey (2018) argued that the evaluation score
captures “feelings of esteem, goodness and warmth that pro-
vide the basis for acts of voluntary compliance,”11 whereas
available. In 2016, a new version of the dictionary with scores col-
lected in 2015 was made publicly available (Robinson et al. 2016).
As a robustness check, we reran our analyses with the 2015 evalu-
ation and potency scores and obtained results nearly identical to
those based on the 2003 scores. Gynecologist was the only occupa-
tional identity available in 2003 but not in 2015. The 2003 and 2015
evaluation scores for the remaining 27 occupations are correlated at
.93, and the power scores are correlated at .94.
11
In a supplementary analysis, we explored the correlation between
the evaluation scores from the 2003 INTERACT dictionary and
the percentage of respondents who perceive an occupation as hav-
ing “high” or “very high” ethical standards from Gallup data on
American perceptions of the level of ethical standards associated
with occupational identities (https://news.gallup.com/poll/1654/
the potency score is indicative of “power, competence, and
strength, which [are characteristics that] enable actors to
compel behaviors from others” (p. 247). Descriptive statis-
tics for the six occupational measures are shown in Table 1B,
and their correlations are shown in Appendix C.
Beliefs about the Social Value of Parent-
Occupation Incumbents
In line with previous research, we measure the valuation of a
target with respect to multiple dimensions of value, including
interpersonal appeal and hostility (Heilman et al. 2004;
Okimoto and Heilman 2012), authenticity (Hicks, Schlegel,
and Newman 2019), and parental worth (Okimoto and
Heilman 2012). Specifically, respondents are asked, “What
are your feelings about someone who is both a [mother/father]
and a [occupational role]?” with respect to the following four
items: (1) likability, (2) sincerity, (3) trustworthiness, and (4)
honesty-ethics-professions.aspx). We were able to match 21 occu-
pations from the two data sets and found a very high positive corre-
lation between the evaluation scores and ethical standards measure
(r = .74).
Noonan et al. 9
H1
Percent Part-Time
Mother-Occupation
H2
Death
H3
Goodness
H4
Percent Female
H5
Median Wage
Father-Occupation
H6
Percent Part-Time
H7
Power
H8
Percent Female
Figure 1.  Correlates of compatibility for mother- and father-occupation pairings.
Note: Bivariate correlation coefficients shown next to each bar. Black bars correspond to correlations with p values < .05. Full models are provided in
Appendix D.
*p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.
attentiveness to children. All items are measured on a nine-
point bipolar scale (e.g., 1 = infinitely unlikable/inatten-
tive, 9 = infinitely likable/attentive) and are highly
correlated with each other for mothers (α = .96) and fathers
(α = .95). Descriptive statistics for these four items are
shown in Table 1A.
Results
Correlates of Parent-Occupation Compatibility
We hypothesized that perceptions of parent-occupation
compatibility would increase as the image of the occupa-
tion became more aligned with the dominant expectations
associated with the parent role. To test these hypotheses, we
calculated correlation statistics for each of the occupation
variables with the parent-occupation compatibility variable
(see Figure 1). All hypotheses for mother-occupation com-
patibility are supported (hypotheses 1a–1d): mother-occu-
pation compatibility is positively correlated with percentage
part-time (r = +.42, p = .031), negatively associated with
death (r = –.41, p = .031), positively correlated with the
goodness score of occupational identities (r = +.58, p =
.001), and highly correlated with percentage female (r =
+.79, p = .000). For the hypotheses for father-occupation
compatibility (hypotheses 2a–2d), all the correlation coef-
ficients are in the hypothesized direction, but only one is
statistically significant. Father-occupation compatibility is
statistically correlated with the power assigned to occupa-
tional identities (r = +.41, p = .030) (hypothesis 2c).
However, father-occupation compatibility is not statisti-
cally correlated with median wages (r = +.09, p = .656),
percentage part-time (r = –.28, p = .160), or percentage
female (r = –.16, p = .412).
0.42*
-0.41*
0.58***
0.79***
0.09
-0.28
0.41*
-0.16
That all the correlation statistics are in the hypothesized
direction suggests that the dominant prescriptive norms for
mothers and fathers indeed constrain the kinds of occupa-
tions deemed compatible for each role. But it is also clear
that there is much stronger support for the hypotheses around
mother-occupation compatibility compared with father-
occupation compatibility.
Next, we ran a series of regression models with mother-
and father-occupation compatibility as the outcome variable
and each of the occupation measures as the independent
variables (for mothers, percentage part-time, death, good-
ness, and percentage female; for fathers, median wages, per-
centage part-time, power, and percentage female) (see
Appendix D). For mothers, the final model generates a nota-
bly large R2 value (73 percent), especially given the sample
size of just 28 occupations. This suggests a very high level
of constraint: dominant expectations of motherhood appear
to strongly predict (constrain) beliefs about which occupa-
tions are “right” for mothers. The constraint on fathers is
substantially lower; the R2 value is only 19 percent. This
difference in predictability is striking. Compared with moth-
ers, the prescriptive norms for fathers seem to have little
impact on constraining ideas about which occupations are
right for them.
Note also the asymmetry with respect to percentage female
and percentage part-time, both of which were hypothesized to
be correlated with mother- and father-occupation compatibil-
ity (but in opposite directions). The results suggest that the
public thinks that mothers are indeed better suited for female-
dominated jobs, but conversely, they find it acceptable for
fathers to venture outside of male-dominated jobs or to work
in jobs more traditionally associated with men (e.g., teacher
vs. laborer, respectively). Similarly, mothers are seen to “fit”
10 Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World 

Table 2.  Regression Results Predicting Parent-Occupation Valuation (Hypothesis 3).

Mothers Fathers

  M1 M2 M3 M4 M5 M6 M7 M8

Attentive to Attentive to
  Likable Sincere Trustworthy Children Likable Sincere Trustworthy Children

Mother-occupation compatibility .83*** (.12) .68*** (.13) .79*** (.11) .95*** (.08)  
Father-occupation compatibility .64** (.20) .64* (.26) .71** (.21) .85** (.25)
Constant 3.20*** (.51) 3.99*** (.53) 3.48*** (.44) 2.67*** (.33) 3.88*** (.84) 4.06** (1.10) 3.70*** (.86) 2.92** (1.05)
Observations 28 28 28 28 28 28 28 28
R2 .64 .52 .68 .84 .28 .18 .31 .31

Note: Values in parentheses are standard errors.

*p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

8.5

R² = 0.6424

Pediatrician

7.5 Librarian Nurse Teacher

Physician
Professor Nursing Aid
Graduate Student Server
Receptionist
Scientist
Secretary
Laborer
Gynecologist
Surgeon
6.5 Psychiatrist
Supervisor
Foreman Manager Salesperson
Army Enlistee Judge Principal
Sheriff
Police Officer
Attorney
5.5

Lobbyist
Politician

4.5
2.0 3.0 4.0 5.0 6.0

Figure 2.  Scatterplot of compatibility (x axis) and likability (y axis), mother-occupation pairings (R2 = .64).
Note: The perceived likability of a pairing is measured on a 9-point scale (1 = infinitely unlikable, 5 = neutral, 9 = infinitely likable). The perceived
compatibility of a pairing is measured on a 6-point scale (1 = very unnatural, 6 = very natural).

better with occupations characterized by part-time work, but
it appears to be acceptable for fathers to pursue occupations
associated with more or fewer part-time opportunities (e.g.,
salesperson vs. judge, respectively).
Parent-Occupation Valuation
We hypothesized that for mothers, a social premium would
accrue to those in compatible role pairings (hypothesis 3).
We find strong support for this hypothesis (see Table 2):
mean compatibility is significantly and positively associated
with all four valuation outcomes (likability, sincerity, trust-
worthiness, and parental worth) for mothers. To illustrate
with one of the four outcomes, Figure 2 displays the scatter-
plot of compatibility and likability for mother-occupation
pairings (with linear fit superimposed) and reveals a strong
positive association between the two measures (R2 = .64).
Mother-occupation pairings that are judged as more compat-
ible tend to be simultaneously judged as more likable (e.g.,
nurse); conversely, mother-occupation pairings judged as
less compatible are simultaneously judged as less likable
(e.g., sheriff).
Noonan et al. 11
Although we find that an increase in compatibility leads
to more positive social evaluations (all regression coeffi-
cients are significant and positive for both mothers and
fathers), clearly the conversion of (in)compatibility into (un)
likability is much tighter for mothers than fathers (see higher
R2 values for mothers compared with fathers). In other words,
perceptions of compatibility do not predict a pairing’s lik-
ability to the same degree for fathers as they do for mothers.
In sum, the public appears to devalue both mothers and
fathers in occupations that are deemed less compatible for
them, but for mothers, compatibility and likability move in
lockstep formation (are more systematically tied) relative to
fathers. This suggests that occupational incompatibility is a
more consistent trigger for how mothers are valued com-
pared with fathers.
Discussion
Managing multiple roles, such as those of worker and parent,
is a key feature of daily life. Cultural beliefs suggest that
work outside of the home aligns with fatherhood but contra-
dicts motherhood (Blair-Loy 2001; Hays 1996; Ridgeway
and Correll 2004). Our study digs deeper into this broad gen-
eralization by unpacking the extent to which certain types of
work roles are viewed as more and less compatible for moth-
ers and fathers. Our sample of raters is not representative of
the U.S. population, and thus our results are preliminary in
terms of what “most people” think, but the patterns we detect
suggest important next steps for future work.
With regard to mothers, we find that we can easily predict
which occupational roles the public perceive as more and
less compatible. For mothers, a compatible occupation is one
that is, above all, female dominated, which translates into an
occupation associated with high ethical standards or “good-
ness,” safety, and part-time opportunities. In contrast, per-
ceptions of father-occupation compatibility are harder to
explain. Only one of the prescriptive norms (power) could
systematically explain variation in perceived compatibility
for father-occupation pairings. Taken together, these findings
suggest that the act of combining mother-occupation roles is
policed vis-à-vis more systematic “rules” than the act of
combining fatherhood with work.
Second, we find that an occupation that is a good fit with
motherhood appears to also confer social value on the
mother: a mother in an incompatible role pairing is judged as
less likable, less sincere, less trustworthy, and less attentive
to her children. This too, is generally true for fathers.
However, the policing process around mothers once again
seems to be stricter. Our results show that we can easily pre-
dict, on the basis of the supposed compatibility of her occu-
pational role, if a mother will be judged as likable, sincere,
trustworthy, and attentive to her children. In stark contrast,
for fathers, attributions of compatibility are relatively weak
predictors of attributions of worth (e.g., likability, sincerity,
attentiveness to children). Given this, the present study
suggests that, from the perspective of cultural beliefs, there
are easily detectable constraints on our ideas about what
mothers should and should not do when it comes to occupa-
tional choice, but our conceptualization of what fathers
should and should not do in terms of occupational choice are
not as obviously constrained. These findings have several
implications.
First, our results suggest that there could be negative men-
tal health repercussions for mothers working in incompatible
occupations. This idea rests on the assumption that cultural
beliefs about the value of the mother-occupation role pairing
(e.g., likability, sincerity) are internalized by individuals
with some degree of intensity; if so, cultural beliefs about
working parents’ occupational choices could affect their
health and well-being. That is, although all working parents
must deal with standard work-family conflict issues (e.g., not
enough hours in the day), mothers working in relatively
incompatible occupations might face additional “soft” penal-
ties if they are treated as less likable and less authentic indi-
viduals. Settles (2004), for example, argued that in the case
of female scientists, the diffuse sense of incompatibility
associated with the pairing could ultimately hurt incumbents’
well-being because (1) the audience, colleagues and noncol-
leagues alike, may feel uncomfortable with women in the
scientist role and hence punish them through acts of discrim-
ination or exclusion (see also Eagly and Karau 2002), and (2)
female scientists are put in the position of having “to alter or
compromise themselves . . . to better fit into the masculine
culture” (Settles 2004:489).
Second, these findings shed light on important next steps
for research exploring the determinants of career choice
among young women (see, e.g., Rosenthal et al. 2011;
Thébaud and Charles 2018). Although young people are
often told to “follow their dreams” and “pursue their pas-
sions,” our findings imply that young women are facing a
landscape in which not only are some occupations perceived
as not a good “fit” for them, but combining the roles of
mother and worker in those occupations will also render
them less likable and less authentic individuals. As an exam-
ple, our study suggests that the mother-teacher role combina-
tion, in terms of cultural beliefs, is seen in a much more
positive light than the mother-lawyer combination. Perhaps
young women who plan to have children or who want to be
particularly involved parents self-select disproportionately
into teaching instead of lawyering in part for this very rea-
son: mother-teacher is seen as a more compatible and likable
combination. Rosy images associated with mothers in certain
occupations, but relatively tarnished images of mothers in
other occupations, may be part of the reason young women
continue to pursue traditionally female-dominated occupa-
tions at a higher rate than traditionally male-dominated
occupations.
Third, future explorations should focus as much on fathers
as mothers. Although our results suggest that perceptions of
compatibility across father-occupation pairings do not appear
12 Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World 
to hinge on the occupational characteristics included in our
model, the explanation for this is not clear. One possibility
mentioned earlier is that prescriptive norms for fathers are not
as strong as the prescriptive norms for mothers (Rudman and
Glick 1999). But another, potentially simpler explanation is
that the one overriding rule for fathers is to work, with less
focus on the type of work they perform. If so, this would imply
that there are simply fewer rules when it comes to combining
work and parenting for men compared with women. Another
possibility is that there are rules for fathers with respect to
occupational choice, but our measures (earnings potential, sex
composition) are simply not tapping into them. It may also be
the case that the position a father holds within an occupation is
more important than the occupation itself; for instance, the
public may assume that fathers working in female-dominated
occupations are in high-ranking leadership positions or in sub-
specialties with high pay and prestige (Pierce 1995; Williams
1995) and thus find both male- and female-dominated occupa-
tions relatively compatible with fatherhood. Finally, it could
also be that viewpoints about what constitutes a good father are
in such a state of flux (Burke and Stets 2009; Collett, Vercel,
and Boykin 2015) that raters are relying on different versions
of a good dad when rating father-occupation compatibility.
To move forward with this line of work, we suggest that
future research replicate and expand the present study by (1)
exploring other measures of perceptions of role compatibility
(e.g., appropriateness instead of naturalness); (2) sampling on
a larger set of occupations; (3) drawing on a large, nationally
representative set of raters and theorizing how raters might
differ in their perceptions of compatibility; and (4) exploring
variation and intersectionality in terms of parent stereotypes.
With respect to perceptions of fit or compatibility, previous
research provided little guidance as to how to measure this
construct. As Freeland and Hoey (2018) demonstrated with
the measurement of occupational prestige, future research
could test for construct and criterion validity by developing
different measures of compatibility. One promising avenue
may be Hunzaker and Valentino’s (2019:954) concept asso-
ciation approach, in which respondents are given pairs of con-
cepts and asked to report, on the basis of “initial instinct,” if
the pair is related or not related.
In terms of sampling on a larger set of occupations, this is
an important next step given that evaluation and potency
scores are now available for more than 300 occupations
(Robinson et al. 2016). Our sample of 28 is diverse in terms
of variability on the occupational characteristics tested here
(see Appendix B), but we are clearly limited in our ability to
test finer grained hypotheses regarding parent-occupation
compatibility that a broader set of occupations that vary in
more subtle ways would permit.
We theorized, for example, that mother-occupation com-
patibility would be negatively correlated with an occupa-
tion’s level of danger. But empirically, an occupation’s death
rate is likely highly correlated with the extent to which it
requires manual labor and strength. In other words, although
we believe that there is a strong case for the public’s being
opposed to mothers’ working in dangerous jobs, an alterna-
tive explanation is that the public feels strongly that mothers
should not work in jobs that involve manual labor. The only
way to convincingly tease apart these explanations is with a
larger sample of occupations.12
Future studies should also, no doubt, aim to use larger
samples of respondents drawn from a nationally representa-
tive sample. As noted earlier, our sample is disproportion-
ately white, young, and highly educated. Importantly, in
addition to generalizability, gathering a larger sample with a
more diverse set of respondents will facilitate the investiga-
tion of whether different subsets of raters subscribe to dif-
ferent cultural schemas on parent-worker compatibility and
display different levels of consensus in their beliefs.13
12
In our data set, only four occupations have high death rates (per
our definition described in the measures section): Army enlistee,
foreman, laborer, and police officer. The first three of these are
also considered manual labor occupations (yes or no) as defined
by Charles and Grusky (2004) and Levanon and Grusky (2016). In
other words, the only case that is not categorized as both dangerous
and manual in our set of 28 occupations is police officer (high death
rate but nonmanual), and it happens to be seen as very incompatible
with motherhood. As a sensitivity analysis, we explored the corre-
lation among manual labor, occupational strength (using data from
O*NET and suggested specific measures from Levanon and Grusky
2016), and mother-occupation compatibility. Occupational strength
is considered a key aspect of manual jobs and is sometimes used as
an alternative indicator of manual labor. Neither the manual labor
categorization nor the strength measure was significantly correlated
with mother-occupation compatibility, although both were in the
hypothesized negative direction. It could be that occupations catego-
rized as manual or requiring high levels of strength are seen as more
incompatible with motherhood, but testing these hypothesis would
require data with a larger number of occupations. Furthermore, to
compare the danger hypothesis against the manual labor hypothesis,
we would need a larger set of occupations that specifically includes
more occupations that are manual but not dangerous.
13
For example, Gauchat and Andrews (2018) examined public
understandings of the field of science and found that perceptions are
shaped by the social location of the rater. Hunzaker and Valentino
(2019) mapped the differences between liberals and conservatives
in terms of the web of meanings surrounding the concept of pov-
erty. In addition, they showed that liberals exhibit more consen-
sus in their cultural schemas around poverty than conservatives.
Regarding perceptions of the occupational hierarchy, Lynn and
Ellerbach (2017) found that not only do raters with more educa-
tion map the hierarchy qualitatively differently than those with less
education, those with more education exhibit more consensus in
their perceptions than raters with less education. Overall, subgroup
differences in both beliefs and consensus should be particularly rel-
evant for theories of how roles are policed, given that beliefs about
role expectations help us understand which aspects of a role are
likely to be policed, while consensus is likely to shed light on how
aggressively role boundaries are enforced, as cultural coherence is
more likely to translate to uniform behavioral directives that are
“harder to escape” (Mueller and Abrutyn 2016:880; Harding 2007).
Noonan et al. 13

Finally, variability in the types of mothers and fathers should
also be incorporated in future studies on perceptions of par-
ent-work compatibility. As noted earlier, the stereotypes
around mothers and fathers are far from monolithic.
Although this dimension of variability was beyond the scope
of this study, future studies featuring larger samples of
respondents could easily examine whether demographic
factors (e.g., race/ethnicity, age of child[ren], marital sta-
tus), style of childrearing (intensive parenting), socioeco-
nomic class, or reason for working (personal fulfillment vs.
financial necessity) affect perceptions of parent-occupation
fit. Currently, for example, there are already strong reasons
to anticipate that perceptions of compatibility will differ for
black and white mothers, given that black mothers are
expected to work (e.g., there may be less perceived compat-
ibility between black mothers in occupations with a high
percentage of part-time work opportunities) (see Cuddy and
Wolf 2013), but it remains less clear if the likability penalty
will differ across racial groups. More generally, the broad
theoretical question moving forward is why we should
expect some roles to be policed more aggressively, in gen-
eral, than others (see Mize and Manago 2018).
In sum, we encourage future researchers to tease out the
nature of the apparent gender asymmetry in constraint and
punishment associated with prescriptive norms for combin-
ing parental roles with occupational roles. Sociologists of
culture argue that the transmission of culture between indi-
viduals is the transmission of “perceptions about which
beliefs or behaviors are compatible with one another”
(Goldberg and Stein 2018:819). In turn, culture can be
“sticky” insofar as ideas and objects can become constrained
in a nexus of meanings (Hays 1994, 1996). This study dem-
onstrates that our understanding of the cultural constraints
(or lack thereof) of any social role can be sharpened by
examining the extent to which the public approves of it being
paired with other social roles.

Appendix A

a. Mother-Occupation Pairings b. Father-Occupation Pairings

Teacher Pediatrician
Pediatrician Teacher
Nursing Aid Principal
Practical Nurse Laborer
Librarian Professor
Receptionist Physician
Principal Supervisor
Server Foreman
Secretary Manager
Physician Police Officer
Supervisor Sheriff
Gynecologist Scientist
Manager Psychiatrist
Sales Lady/Man Practical Nurse
Professor Librarian
Psychiatrist Army Enlistee
Graduate Student Judge
Laborer Server
Scientist Sales Lady/Man
Police Officer Politician
Surgeon Graduate Student
Judge Surgeon
Attorney Nursing Aid
Foreman Gynecologist
Lobbyist Attorney
Sheriff Receptionist
Politician Secretary
Army Enlistee Lobbyist
2 4 6 2 4 6

Figure A1.  Ninety-five percent confidence intervals for mean compatibility, 28 parent-occupation role combinations.
Note: Perceived compatibility of a pairing (x axis) is measured on a 6-point scale (1 = “very unnatural,” 6 = “very natural”).
14 Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World 

Appendix B
Data for Occupation Variables

Table B1.  American Community Survey 2016.

Variable: Percentage Part-

Time

Percentage in Occupation
Average Hours Working <35 Hours/
Identity Crosswalk to ACS and CFOI Occupational Titles Worked Week
Army enlistee NA NA NA
Attorney Lawyers, judges, and related workers 45 9.4
Foreman First-line supervisors of construction trades and extraction workers 45 5.9
Graduate student Postsecondary teachers 37 31.2
Gynecologist Physicians and surgeons 50 10.6
Judge Lawyers, judges, and related workers 45 9.4
Laborer Construction laborers 40 16.9
Librarian Librarians 35 26.1
Lobbyist Public relations specialists 41 6.4
Manager General and operations managers 47 3.5
Nursing aid Nursing, psychiatric, and home health aides 36 31.5
Pediatrician Physicians and surgeons 50 10.6
Physician Physicians and surgeons 50 10.6
Police officer Police officers 43 3.1
Politician Chief executives and legislators 47 8.0
Practical nurse Licensed practical and licensed vocational nurses 37 23.2
Principal Education administrators 43 10.5
Professor Postsecondary teachers 37 31.2
Psychiatrist Physicians and surgeons 50 10.6
Receptionist Receptionists and information clerks 33 35.3
Sales lady/man Retail salespersons 33 44.2
Scientist Physical scientists 42 4.2
Secretary Secretaries and administrative assistants 36 23.3
Server Waiters and waitresses 29 60.3
Sheriff First-line supervisors of police and detectives 44 1.1
Supervisor First-line supervisors of production and operating workers 45 3.0
Surgeon Physicians and surgeons 50 10.6
Teacher Elementary and middle school teachers 41 13

Note: ACS = American Community Survey; CFOI = Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries; NA = not available.

Table B2.  O*NET Version 20.1 and Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries 2017.

Variable: Median
Annual Wage Fatal Injury Variable:
Identity Crosswalk to O*NET Occupation Titles O*NET Code (2017) CFOI Code Ratea Deathb
Army enlistee NA 22,277c 71.5d 1
Attorney Lawyers 23-1011.00 119,250 23-0000 0.6 0
Foreman First-line supervisors of construction 47-1011.00 64,070 47-1011 17.4 1
trades and extraction workers
Graduate Graduate teaching assistants 25-1191.00 32,460 25-0000 0.4 0
student
Gynecologist Obstetricians and gynecologists 29-1064.00 208,000 (286,000)e 29-0000 0.6 0
Judge Judges, magistrate judges, and magistrates 23-1023.00 133,840 23-0000 0.6 0

(continued)
Noonan et al. 15

Table B2. (continued)

Variable: Median
Annual Wage Fatal Injury Variable:
Identity Crosswalk to O*NET Occupation Titles O*NET Code (2017) CFOI Code Ratea Deathb
Laborer Construction laborers 47-2061.00 34,530 47-2061 14.2 1
Librarian Librarians 25-4021.00 58,520 25-0000 0.4 0
Lobbyist Public relations and fund-raising managers 27-3031.00 59,300 27-0000 1.6 0
Manager General and operations managers 11-1021.00 100,410 11-0000 2.1 0
Nursing aid Nursing assistants 31-1014.00 27,520 31-0000 0.9 0
Pediatrician Pediatricians, general 29-1065.00 172,650 (202,000)e 29-0000 0.6 0
Physician Family and general practitioners 29-1062.00 198,740 29-0000 0.6 0
Police officer Police patrol officers 33-3051.01 61,050 33-3051 12.9 1
Politician Legislators 11-1031.00 25,630 11, 13 1.6 0
Practical nurseLicensed practical and licensed vocational 29-2061.00 45,030 29-0000 0.6 0
nurses
Principal Education administrators, elementary and 11-9032.00 94,390 11-0000 2.1 0
secondary school
Professor Chemistry teachers, postsecondary 25-1052.00 77,190 25-0000 0.4 0
Psychiatrist Psychiatrists 29-1066.00 208,000 (235,000)e 29-0000 0.6 0
Receptionist Receptionists and information clerks 43-4171.00 28,390 43-0000 0.6 0
Sales lady/man Retail salespersons 41-2031.00 23,210 41-2031 1.6 0
Scientist Chemists 19-2031.00 76,690 19-0000 0.9 0
Secretary Secretaries and administrative assistants, 43-6014.00 35,590 43-0000 0.6 0
except legal, medical, and executive
Server Waiters and waitresses 35-3031.00 20,280 35-0000 1.4 0
Sheriff First-line supervisors of police and 33-1012.00 87,910 33-0000 7.7 0
detectives
Supervisor First-line supervisors of production and 51-1011.00 58,870 51-1011 3.8 0
operating workers
Surgeon Surgeons 29-1067.00 208,000 (352,000)e 29-0000 0.6 0
Teacher Elementary school teachers, except special 25-2021.00 57,160 25-0000 0.4 0
education

Note: CFOI = Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries; NA = not available.

a
Number of fatal occupational injuries per 100,000 full-time equivalent workers for civilian workers in 2017 (https://www.bls.gov/iif/oshcfoi1.html).
b
Death is a dichotomous variable based on the 75th percentile of the fatal injury rate across all occupations: 1 = above 75th percentile, 0 = not.
c
O*NET excludes military occupations. “Army enlistee” median wage is from www.payscale.com “Army private first class, infantry (light infantry).”
d
“Army enlistee” is assigned death = 1 on the basis of the fatality rate of active duty military personnel in the U.S. armed forces from 1990 to 2011 of
71.5 per 100,000 (Armed Forces Health Surveillance Center 2012).
e
For medical specialties, we replaced O*NET wage data with more detailed data from the “Medscape Physician Compensation Report 2017” (https://
www.medscape.com/slideshow/compensation-2017-overview-6008547), which are provided in parentheses. The results of the empirical analyses are
virtually the same if we use the O*NET median wage or the Medscape data.

Table B3.  Current Population Survey 2018 and Other Sources.

Variable: Percentage
Identity Crosswalk to CPS Occupation Titles or More Detailed Data Source Female
Army enlistee [Active-duty service members] https://www.defense.gov/News/Special- 16.2
Reports/Womens-History/
Attorney Lawyers 37.4
Foreman First-line supervisors of construction trades and extraction workers 3.5
Graduate student Weeden, Thébaud, and Gelbgiser (2017) 46.0
Gynecologist [Obstetrics and gynecology] AAMC 47.4
Judge [Judge] https://www.nawj.org/statistics 33.0
Laborer Construction laborers 3.7
Librarian Librarians 78.5
Lobbyist Nownes and Freeman (1998) 5.0

(continued)
16 Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World 

Table B3. (continued)

Variable: Percentage
Identity Crosswalk to CPS Occupation Titles or More Detailed Data Source Female
Manager Management occupations 40.0
Nursing aid Nursing, psychiatric, and home health aides 89.3
Pediatrician [Pediatrics] AAMC 58.1
Physician Physicians and surgeons 40.3
Police officer Police and sheriff’s patrol officers 15.4
Politician [Politician] https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SG.GEN.PARL.ZS 19.6
Practical nurse Registered nurses 88.6
Principal [Principal] https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2013/2013313.pdf 52.0
Professor Postsecondary teachers 49.0
Psychiatrist [Psychiatry] AAMC 34.8
Receptionist Receptionists and information clerks 90.5
Sales lady/man Sales and related occupations 49.4
Scientist Life, physical, and social science occupations 46.7
Secretary Secretaries and administrative assistants 94.0
Server Waiters and waitresses 69.9
Sheriff First-line supervisors of police and detectives 17.0
Supervisor First-line supervisors of production and operating workers 19.6
Surgeon [General surgery] AAMC 15.4
Teacher Elementary and middle school teachers 79.8

Note: AAMC = Association of American Medical Colleges, Physician Specialty Data Book Center for Workforce Studies November (2012); CPS =
Current Population Survey.

Table B4.  Compatibility Scores and INTERACT Sentiment Scores (Evaluation and Potency).

Mean Compatibility Mean Goodness Mean Power

Identity Mother Father (Evaluation) (Potency)

Army enlistee 2.92 3.98 1.43 1.08
Attorney 3.42 3.66 .48 2.03
Foreman 3.33 4.51 .48 1.36
Graduate student 4.00 3.90 1.45 1.20
Gynecologist 4.24 3.73 .82 1.06
Judge 3.52 3.96 1.00 2.23
Laborer 3.90 4.76 1.15 .37
Librarian 4.69 4.00 1.36 –.49
Lobbyist 3.28 3.34 .40 .91
Manager 4.23 4.40 .91 1.92
Nursing aid 5.02 3.82 2.26 1.22
Pediatrician 5.28 5.19 2.54 1.79
Physician 4.40 4.64 2.25 2.21
Police officer 3.63 4.39 .17 1.40
Politician 3.02 3.91 –.38 2.04
Practical nurse 4.80 4.06 2.55 1.68
Principal 4.64 4.78 1.35 2.13
Professor 4.17 4.66 1.72 1.73
Psychiatrist 4.17 4.12 1.12 1.38
Receptionist 4.65 3.38 1.33 .10
Sales lady/man 4.21 3.94 –.10 .50
Scientist 3.81 4.15 1.53 1.70
Secretary 4.47 3.36 1.19 –.15
Server 4.60 3.94 1.16 .26
(continued)
Noonan et al. 17

Table B4. (continued)

Mean Compatibility Mean Goodness Mean Power

Identity Mother Father (Evaluation) (Potency)

Sheriff 3.16 4.20 .95 1.49
Supervisor 4.36 4.62 .90 2.03
Surgeon 3.55 3.83 2.77 2.82
Teacher 5.43 5.00 2.65 2.09

Note: INTERACT is an online database of ratings of 1,500 stimuli, including behaviors and identities, compiled between 2001 and 2003 from 1,027
respondents, all of whom were Indiana University students at the time of the survey and had been residents of the United States at age 16 (Francis and
Heise 2006). Evaluation and potency ratings are publicly available for 31 occupational identities, but 4 are specific to the military. We kept only one
military identity (Army enlistee), which resulted in a final set of 28 occupations/occupational identities.

Appendix C
Correlation Table for Occupation Variables.

Percentage Percentage Evaluation

Part-Time Death Median Wage Female (Goodness)
Death –.20  
.31  
Median wage –.38 –.23  
.05 .23  
Percentage female .58 –.51 –.20  
.00 .01 .30  
Evaluation (goodness) .10 –.23 .32 .45  
.61 .24 .10 .02  
Potency (power) –.58 –.16 .47 –.35 .25
.00 .42 .01 .07 .20
n 27 28 28 28 28

Note: P values are listed beneath the Pearson correlation coefficients. Boldface values represent correlations with p values < .05.

Appendix D
Correlates of Parent-Occupation Compatibility.

Mother-Occupation Compatibility Father-Occupation Compatibility

H1a H1b H1c H1d H2a H2b H2c H2d  

Occupational Occupational
Characteristics M1 M2 M3 M4 M5 Characteristics M6 M7 M8 M9 M10
Percentage part- .02* .00 Median wage .00 –.00
time (.01) (.01) (.00) (.00)
Death –.77* .27 Percentage part- –.01 –.00
  (.34) (.26) time (.01) (.01)
Evaluation .48** .27* Potency (power) .25* .26
(goodness)   (.13) (.10) (.11) (.15)
Percentage female .02*** .02*** Percentage female –.00 –.00
  (.00) (.00) (.00) (.00)
Constant 3.83*** 4.21*** 3.50*** 3.27*** 3.07*** Constant 4.10*** 4.32*** 3.81*** 4.27*** 3.94***
(.18) (.13) (.20) (.15) (.18) (.14) (.14) (.17) (.17) (.34)
Observations 27 28 28 28 27 Observations 28 27 28 28 27
R2 17% 17% 34% 63% 73% R2 1% 8% 17% 3% 19%
Correlation .42 –.41 .58 .79 Correlation .09 –.28 .41 –.16  
p value .03 .03 .00 .00 p value .66 .16 .03 .41  

Note: Values in parentheses are standard errors.

*p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.
18 Socius: Sociological Research for a Dynamic World 
Authors’ Note
An earlier version of this article was presented at the 2016 annual
meeting of the American Sociological Association. We thank Rob
Freeland and Jennifer Glass for their feedback on previous drafts.
We also thank Christin Landivar for help retrieving the American
Community Survey data and Asaf Levanon for data on manual/non-
manual distinction for occupations.
ORCID iDs
Mary C. Noonan https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8675-1750
Mark H. Walker https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5004-7382
Supplemental Material
Supplemental material for this article is available online.
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Author Biographies
Mary C. Noonan is an associate professor in the Department of
Sociology and Criminology at the University of Iowa. Her research
explores the relationship between gender, family responsibilities, and
work outcomes. She is currently working on a project examining how
daycare and school closures associated with the coronavirus disease
2019 pandemic have affected parents’ work and family lives.
Freda B. Lynn is an associate professor in the Department of
Sociology and Criminology at the University of Iowa. Her research
interests include status, inequality, and the social construction of
value. She is currently conducting research on inequality in science,
public perceptions of occupations and scholarly disciplines, and the
academic pathways of college students.
Mark H. Walker is an assistant professor of sociology at Louisiana
State University. His research interests include self and identity,
social networks, and mental health.